In the heart of Silicon Valley, Stanford frequently plays host (and even incubator) for some of the most cutting-edge research, development, and technology trends that are changing the way we communicate and conduct business every day.

Bitcoin has made its presence known. After the initial hype and volatility, a number of unanswered questions remain. Susan Athey discusses the technological innovation behind Bitcoin and its broader applications, as well as crypto-currency’s potential impact on financial systems, industries—even world economies.

Virtual reality is here — what does that mean for your business? Early adopters such as Merrill Lynch, Toyota, LinkedIn and Konica Minolta are already seeing dramatic results in learning simulations, training, and marketing effectiveness. Professor Bailenson draws on his years of psychology experiments in Stanford’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab to demonstrate, in dramatic video footage, the power of virtual reality.

Citing intriguing examples from Oracle, Southwest Airlines, Walmart, Comcast, and Starbucks, Charlene Li shows us how companies can use social media tools to develop more intimate and beneficial relationships with customers.

Many of history's greatest growth markets were created by a disruptive technology that was met with resistance from traditional industries and organizations. Clayton Christensen demonstrates that in order to create business in emerging markets, you need appropriate management of technological innovation and the ability to find markets for technologies.

Leaders of organizations need to understand how cognitive processing, decision making, memory, and motivation change as they, their employees, and their customers age. Dr. Carstensen shares research findings on motivation grounded in the uniquely human perception of time horizons and the theory of “socioemotional selectivity,” in which our values and goals change over time.

The drive to invent that Bill Hewlett and David Packard shared when they launched HP in a garage decades ago is critical to organizations today. As we shift from a knowledge-based economy to a creative economy, innovation-driven companies will be the leaders. Fortunately, says Phil McKinney, creativity is a skill that can be practiced and learned, and he shares his “FIRE + PO” process for tapping human ingenuity.

Based on 25 years of experience in Silicon Valley, David DeWalt details his seven principles for building a successful enterprise. While not all seven are neccessarily critical to success, DeWalt says if you can't get the first two right you're bound to fail.

Tim Brown advocates using the three stages of “design thinking”: inspiration, ideation, and implementation to create successful innovations that are desirable to consumers, technically feasible, and viable from a business point of view.

Never has there been a more exciting or hazardous time to be at the helm of a corporation. How do you stay out of the band of mediocrity and position your company to become an architect of industry revolution? Reinvent who you are in meaningful ways, and move beyond incremental change to industry reconception.